A CHAMPION bowler has been banned from her club for 30 years after she admitted slapping a “sexist” player in an equality row.

Medal-winning Kathleen Wright, 60, had been with Craigie Bowling Club for 23 years and was pushing for women to have the same rights as men.

The Commonwealth Games volunteer says she hit the un-named 26-year-old man after sexist remarks were made during a clubroom dispute.

Mrs Wright has accused the club, in the upmarket Dundee suburb of Broughty Ferry, of conducting a “witchhunt”.

Her husband, retired civil servant and club trustee John, 56, resigned after he says he was told by an official to choose between his wife and the club.

Craigie Bowling Club, established in 1917, has annual membership fees of up to £500.

Mrs Wright claims that, after new equality legislation was introduced in Scotland in 2010, the sports club failed to make legal changes to give women equal rights.

The grandmother, a member of Craigie since 1994 and ladies’ match secretary for 15 years, said: “It all started very tongue in cheek. We had all been in the same company so many times, but there was one thing that he kept saying that was sexist.

“I asked him to stop it and then said I would slap him. So I did, although I would describe it as more of a tip on his cheek.

“Everyone was laughing and he kept telling me to slap him harder, which I did. Then he said he would knock me to the floor and walked out the club.”

I should not have slapped him, I admit I made a mistake

Kathleen Wright

Mrs Wright, who has only just been informed of the ban, claimed she was in the club’s bad books after fighting for equal rights.

She said: “In July, I had been due to play in the ladies’ singles finals on the same day as the men, which had been allowed by management committee.

“However, the match secretary of the green committee overturned it because he complained and said it was a man’s night and women were not allowed.”

She added: “I should not have slapped him, I admit I made a mistake, but I believe the club was just waiting for me to do something it could use against me.”

Mrs Wright, who is currently the club’s ladies champion and represented Craigie three times in the Scottish Bowls National Finals, could now make an official complaint to governing body Bowl Scotland.

A spokesman for the umbrella organisation said that it always encouraged an inclusive approach, and sexist incidents at clubs were “extremely rare”.

One committee member of Craigie Bowling Club, Sidney Clark, described the allegations of sexism as “absolute c***”.

He added that the club had advised the man Mrs Wright slapped to go to the police.